Champagne socialist: Bob Crow is one of thousands who are still living in a subsidised house despite earning more than £100,000 a year

Union boss Bob Crow is just one of thousands of tenants still living in a council house despite having a six-figure income, figures show.

Up to 5,000 taxpayer-subsidised tenants cannot be kicked out despite having a household income that tops £100,000 a year - because there are no rules allowing councils to do so.

The figures were released by the Department for Communities and Local Government.

Bob Crow, the general secretary of the RMT union behind London's tube strikes, infamously said he had 'no moral duty' to leave his council house despite now earning £145,000 a year.

'I was born in a council house, as far as I’m concerned I will die in one,' he told a radio interview in November.

‘Yes I could buy my own place but why don’t you ask the rest of my family who live at home with me whether they should have to move as well?’ he said.

‘Why is it just down to me to buy a house? Why should my family who have lived there for 30 years, with all the friends they’ve got, have to move because of the job I’ve got?

‘If I moved out of my house tomorrow the first thing you’d say is Comrade Crow leaves his roots.’

The data - reported today in the Sunday Telegraph and seen by MailOnline - also shows up to 8,000 council or housing association households earn more than £80,000 a year, and up to 21,000 earn more than £60,000.

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The average income for all British households with two working adults is around £40,000 a year.

Councils and housing associations save their housing stock for tenants with low incomes, but once they have moved in it is difficult to remove them if they start earning a high salary.

Utopian: Many council estates like this one in Camden north London, were erected in the post-war years to flood the nation with cheaper housing but there is now a shortage - and some are now occupied by rich tenants

HIGH INCOMES IN COUNCIL HOMES

Household income | Estimated tenants

£100,000+ | 1,000 - 5,000

£80,000+ | 3,000 - 8,000

£60,000+ | 11,000 - 21,000

Source: DCLG research from July 2013

Britain has a huge shortage of social
housing, attributed by some to a failure to replenish stock after Margaret Thatcher's Right to Buy policy of the 1980s.

To create more social housing now, public spending not only subsidises tenants' rent but
also injects millions of pounds in grants to build new homes.

Ministers
have drawn up plans to allow housing associations to increase the
rent they charge to high-earning tenants for the first time.

He added: 'Taxpayer-subsidised homes are meant to help the most vulnerable in society. These high income tenants should consider their position in relation to the many other people on council waiting lists who are in more need of support.

'Their actions are not only blocking homes that could benefit those in greater housing need, they're also relying on poorer taxpayers to subsidise their lifestyle.'

Critics told the Sunday Telegraph the new rules could have a downside by encouraging tenants to turn down higher-paid jobs.

Some councils also said there was a benefit to having a mixed demographic on council estates because it helped stop rich and poor from becoming ghettoised.

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Thousands of wealthy professionals living in council homes despite earning six-figure salaries because of rules that mean they CAN'T be thrown out